Elon Musk's New York Times Interview Still Left Us With a Lot of Questions

On Thursday, Elon Musk, chairman and chief executive officer of Tesla, boyfriend of one Claire Boucher, and future colonizer of Mars, granted an hour-long phone interview to The New York Times. The resulting story, which features four bylines, as well as an “additional reporting” credit for Andrew Ross Sorkin, details Musk’s “excruciating” past year, both in terms of his business and his personal life—except, wait, no, he doesn’t get into his personal life at all.

The Times published a companion piece compiling all the highlights from the interview—all four of them—for those with shorter attention spans. This includes an explanation of his tweet about taking Tesla private—fired off from the back seat of a car en route to the airport—that resulted in the company’s shares going up 11 percent in value. Musk explained that he does not regret sending said tweet; that he was not high (“not on weed,” to be precise) at the time of sending said tweet; and that the “worst is yet to come” in his personal, if not professional, life.

But, okay, enough about the tweet. Among the highlights there is no mention of the things we're most curious about. There’s been so much since then, and the unremitting focus on the tweet only further underscores everything Musk didn’t address in the interview. Because for all he says “the worst is yet to come” in his non-work life, he doesn’t really get into the personal turmoil that has become such a focus, at least on Twitter, Musk’s platform of choice. (He has “no plans” to stop tweeting, according to the Times interview.) It’s actually sort of perplexing, given that the Azealia Banks feud was the most recent catalyst, presumably, for this emotional interview. I have many questions, and if the Times wants to add my byline to the five already on this piece, I’d be happy to contribute. Here’s what the story does not address: